Philippe Bradshaw’s Disco Damage was an enmeshed environment of painting, sculpture, video, and live action. The exhibition was constructed around seven installations consisting of layers of chain tapestries, sculpted objects, and video projections. The works functioned as three-dimensional paintings, inviting the viewer to enter the layers of chains and become part of the art experience.

Well-known paintings from various periods in art history were painstakingly reproduced at enormous sizes with tiny links of colored chain. The images that Bradshaw chose for his chain tapestries were loaded with provocative content, usually erotic. The chains were hung from the ceiling, sometimes in as many as four layers, creating a sculptural environment. Videos of the artist’s model, his studio activities, and footage of his frequent studio parties were projected through the chains onto the wall.

The main gallery featured a vivid environment built around chain tapestries of famous images by Hokusai, Fragonard, Boucher, and Manet. A trampoline and a sculpted boat occupied the center of the gallery, providing a set for the impromptu performances that took place every day for the duration of the exhibition, in which the gallery audience was invited to participate. Performance footage was then incorporated back into the installation.

The storefront gallery featured a four-layer chain tapestry based on Andy Warhol’s Electric Chair, with a sculpted chair in the center. The video projection through the chains could be viewed from the street. The storefront also contained an installation based on Mondrian’s Broadway Boogie Woogie, 1942–43. These two works were the artist’s homage to New York.

The tapestries were woven from the same type of colored chain traditionally hung in doorways in tropical countries to keep out mosquitoes. The material evoked warm evenings in sleazy bars, memories that perhaps come from the movies rather than one’s own life experience. The chains were simultaneously kitschy and sensuous. The vulgar material was an ironic contrast to the masterpieces of art history that they reproduced. The experience of moving one’s hand through the chain and then walking through the lush image of the painting was like putting a hand under someone’s clothing and entering into an erotically-charged experience. Disco Damage brought the spirit of Bradshaw’s London studio into the New York gallery, evoking the energy and excesses of his London art scene.